Politics and Law

NIST, the group that oversees encryption standards in the US, said Tuesday that it "would not deliberately weaken a cryptographic standard." The statement comes amid concern that the National Security Agency may have meddled with a method adopted by the group, in order to gain a back door for surveillance.

"Recent news reports have questioned the cryptographic standards development process at NIST," reads a statement issued today by the National Institute of Standards and Technology. "We want to assure the IT cybersecurity community that the transparent, public process used to rigorously vet our standards is … Read more

The iPhone apparently is popular not just with consumers but with the National Security Agency, though for somewhat different reasons.

The NSA can retrieve user data on iOS, Android, and BlackBerry devices, according to internal classified documents obtained by German news outlet Der Spiegel. Special task forces within the agency have reportedly studied the three mobile platforms with the goal of accessing the contacts, instant messaging traffic, and location data found on the devices.

The classified documents don't point to any "large-scale" snooping of smartphone owners, but they do highlight the historic record of a few specific … Read more

The National Security Agency allegedly has snooped through the networks of Google, a Brazilian oil company, and an international bank cooperative.

US documents obtained by Brazilian TV network Globo reportedly detail the spying and instruct NSA agents on how to tap into private computer networks, Reuters said Monday. Globo aired the findings on Sunday night.

The targets cited in the report all hold prominent international roles. Google is the dominant search engine in many countries. Petrobras is one of the world's largest oil producers. And as an international bank cooperative, the Society for Worldwide Interbank Financial Telecommunication (SWIFT) conducts … Read more

The National Security Agency has the ability to access user data on three of the most popular smartphone platforms, including BlackBerry's e-mail system, according to classified documents viewed by German news outlet Spiegel.

The US intelligence-gathering agency has created platform-specific working groups to tap the contact lists, SMS traffic, and user location information on the Apple iOS, Google Android, and BlackBerry mobile operating systems, the documents indicate. NSA scripts allow the agency to access at least 38 iPhone features after the agency infiltrates the computer used to sync the device, Spiegel reported.

The documents also indicate that the agency … Read more

California is the home of everything that's new, exciting, and, well, accidentally nefarious.

It's a delight, therefore, to hear that we here in the Golden State might be the first to get electronic license plates.

Yes, the young and the restless of tech will be able to have their new "TE$LA1" plate beamed directly to their car.

What could be more moving? I am beaming at Ars Technica for discovering that a bill has passed the California State Senate, allowing for a pilot program to launch the scheme.

If the Governor signs the bill, 0.… Read more

Google has kicked into high gear a plan to encrypt data sent between its data centers, in the wake of the National Security Agency spying scandal.

The Washington Post reports that Google's plan was devised last year, but was put on the front burner to help safeguard the company's reputation in the wake of the surveillance documents leaked by former NSA tech worker Edward Snowden.

"It's an arms race," Eric Grosse, Google's vice president for security engineering, told the Post. "We see these government agencies as among the most skilled players in this … Read more

Yahoo has issued its first-ever global transparency report, joining other tech companies that are trying to quell suspicions of overzealous cooperation with government surveillance agencies.

The report covers the six-month period from January 1, 2013, through June 30, 2013, and shows how many government-made requests for customer data were received or processed by Yahoo in countries where the company has a legal entity. That covers four regions: the Americas, Asia-Pacific, Europe, and Latin America.

During that period, according to the report, Yahoo's US arm received 12,444 government data requests "such as criminal law enforcement requests and those … Read more

Despite losing a '90s era debate over allowing a government back door into all encryption technologies, the US National Security Agency set up a clandestine program code-named Bullrun and can now circumvent much of the virtual armor intended to protect digital communications -- from everyday e-mails to financial and medical records -- according to a report from The New York Times.

The report -- assembled in partnership with the UK's Guardian newspaper and nonprofit news organization ProPublica -- cites documents provided by Prism leaker Edward Snowden, as well as interviews with industry officials, in saying that the NSA has … Read more

I am always suspicious that those who want to suppress a certain activity are somehow involved in the activity themselves.

You must draw your own conclusions about the nation whose politicians recently decided it ought to have a porn filter.

For news reaches me that some of those same politicians might be having a hard time filtering porn out of their own lives.

Since May 2012, the servers in the UK Parliament have been straining under the demands of users' titillations.

Searches for porn have been slavishly performed 300,00 times, no doubt under the guise of "research."… Read more